


all your colors start to burn

by togetherwecouldbealright



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Fashion & Models, Alternate Universe - Photographer, Alternate Universe - Soulmates, M/M, can harry's instagram free itself, idk this is dumb and lame but whatever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-07
Updated: 2015-03-07
Packaged: 2018-03-16 17:27:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,207
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3496697
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/togetherwecouldbealright/pseuds/togetherwecouldbealright
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis is the color in Harry's black and white world.</p>
            </blockquote>





	all your colors start to burn

**Author's Note:**

> I honestly do not even know what this is other than a dedication of my love for Maddie because there is really no other explanation for this. Happy birthday Maddie, I love you a whole lot and I will until we're old and gray (which is probably when I'll finish your ACTUAL birthday present, I'm sorry that I suck) but in the mean time, this is for you.
> 
> Also, can Harry Styles please free me, himself and everyone else involved by posting on color on instagram because I'm tired and I want to see Louis Tomlinson in color. That is all.
> 
> This is honestly awful, like genuinely. I apologize on behalf of myself. I'll have a new, better fic up really soon, I promise. Title from 'Take Shelter' by Years & Years.

Black and white.

That’s all everyone knows for the first eighteen years of their life. Just simple black and white. Varying degrees of it, perhaps, but always, always black and white.

Harry is twenty one and he still knows only black and white.

It’s hard because Harry wants to see color—he wants it _so_ bad but it’s just slightly out of reach and no matter how hard he tries, it won’t happen.

That’s where fate plays a part.

Every person has a soulmate, someone who’s meant for them and only them. It’s someone who understands them better than anyone else could ever dream of trying. It’s someone who’s their best friend and someone who will love them no matter what.

When you meet your soulmate and touch them for the first time, the world isn’t black and white anymore.

It’s red and blue and green and pink and orange and purple and it’s _everything_. It’s absolutely everything and it’s all that Harry wants.

What makes it worse is that there are certain rules. If you haven’t met your soulmate yet and you still see in black and white, then everything you own and are a part of is also black and white.

He doesn’t know how it works but it’s just a thing that happens and has been happening since the beginning of time.

Someone who sees in color could give someone else a present that’s bright yellow and it would become black and white the second that the person who can’t see in color touches it. An actress who sees in black and white could be in a movie and every scene that she’s in would become black and white.

It limits people—limits what they can and can’t do. No one wants someone who only sees black and white over someone who sees in color.

Harry is one of those limited people.

He’s a photographer and a _good_ one at that. He’s world renowned and all over the world, people know his name. They know of Harry Styles, the photographer with pictures that are fluid with motion and alive despite the stillness.

The only complaints he ever receives are the ones about the fact that all his pictures are in black and white. It’s a flaw to them.

And it’s not as though Harry has a choice in the matter because if he did, he wouldn’t take another photo in black and white ever again. He’s had more than enough of his fill of black and white to last him forever.

So Harry settles on waiting. He doesn’t really have any other options and he believes that fate will come through for him. He won’t be stuck in a bleak world of grey tones forever.

Now the only question left is when and where.

The answer turns out to be on a Monday morning in the bathroom.

—

“Niall, why is this happening to me?” Harry groans, speaking into his phone while maneuvering his way through the lobby of his photo shoot. He’s late—so bloody late. “I’m a good person, am I not?”

As he says that, he nearly drops his camera equipment onto the hardwood floor along with himself when someone shoves him a little too roughly. Thankfully he catches himself before he can hit the floor and breathes a sigh of relief.

“You’re a decent person,” Niall allows, sounding far too amused. “Maybe if you’d spent a little less time on Instagram and a little more time getting ready in the mornings, you wouldn’t be so late.”

Harry scowls even though his best friend can’t see him. “I’ve got about ten million followers to impress, Niall and it’s not as if my color aesthetic is doing me any good.”

“Yeah, it’s fuckin’ ugly,” Niall agrees amicably. “I’m honestly going to have to unfollow you soon. It’s a sore sight for my eyes.”

“It’s not my fault,” Harry says and it’s incredibly reminiscent to a whine.

On the other end of line, Niall laughs and Harry thinks he might hear Melly laughing too in the background. They’re both horrible, horrible people and they deserve to have each other.

“Just go do your job Haz, they don’t pay you to sit around,” his best friend teases and Harry hates to say it, but he’s right.

Harry’s already incredibly late and he’s almost positive he has an important client today but he can’t remember who it is for the life of him. In his honest defense, it’s a Monday morning, he hit snooze three times and it’s raining outside. That’s a formula for disaster.

He sighs, knowing that now that his day is off to a horrible start, it won’t pick up any time soon.

After saying his goodbyes, Harry hangs up on Niall and heads into his studio nearly fifteen minutes after he should’ve been there.

Across the room his manager Liam is giving him disappointed eyes and Harry offers a sheepish smile back before heading over to set up his stuff.

Thankfully, whoever the client seems to be is running as late he is and it gives Harry a chance to catch his breath and snap a photograph of Liam who’s watching the door with deep set eyebrows and his lips quirked down into a frown.

“So whose photos am I taking today?” Harry shouts across the room once he’s finished setting up and has a camera strapped around his neck.

Liam turns to give him a flat look. “Are you joking?”

Harry blinks at him. “Why would I be joking? But actually, did you want to hear a joke because I thought of a really good one this morning and—”

“No,” Liam interrupts, sounding exasperated but Harry can hear the hint of fondness there. “I really don’t. Have you seriously forgotten whose photo shoot is today?”

“Is it someone really important?” Harry wonders before musing, “Is it the Queen? I think I would’ve remembered that. Or maybe Prince George? I would love to take pictures of Prince George. I bet he makes the cutest faces.”

Harry is used to the dry expression on Liam’s face enough that it doesn’t cause his smile to drop at all. “While your obsession with babies is endearing, I’d hope you remember whose photo shoot this is despite it not being the Queen of England. You were so excited about it just last month?” Liam tries, moving his hands in a gesture that Harry doesn’t try to understand.

He tries to rack his brains for who he might have been freaking out over but nothing comes to mind until the doors open and his jaw drops in response.

Louis Tomlinson. He’s photographing Louis Tomlinson today.

How could he have _forgotten_?

Louis Tomlinson is one of the most beautiful human beings that Harry has ever laid eyes on and it’s fitting that he’s a model.

He’s been a model since he was eighteen (and back then Harry was sixteen, hanging up pictures of Louis on his wall and decidedly not wanking off to them) and he’s been in the modeling industry for five years and only become more and more famous.

Everyone who’s worked with him calls him a delight and claims that the camera absolutely adores him. Louis is simply cinematic.

Harry has been dying to get a chance to photograph him and see for himself and when Liam told him about the photo shoot, he almost fainted.

It’s clear that he’s been having an extremely bad morning if he forgot that he was going to get a chance to photograph Louis fucking Tomlinson.

“Hi,” Harry squeaks before clearing his throat and repeating again in a more normal tone, “Hi.”

Louis looks up then and Harry’s breath catches in his throat. He’s even more beautiful than the pictures made him seen.

The first thing Harry notices are his eyelashes that fan across his cheeks with a sweeping motion every time he blinks, fluttering gently. His cheekbones are sharp enough to cut glass, causing his face to be incredibly narrow and alluring. He has just the slightest hint of facial hair dusting his cheeks and thin lips that he’s licking as he watches Harry.

Harry doesn’t know what color Louis’ eyes are (well he does, only because he’s read about it in a magazine; they’re _blue_ , whatever that is) but he has no doubt that they’re as beautiful as the rest of him.

“Hello,” Louis says and his voice is sweet and airy, reminding him of a song. “I’m sorry I’m late. Zayn refused to leave his house without coffee.”

Then Harry sees the man beside him who’s also incredibly beautiful, but more in an immaculate way. It's nothing compared to Louis’ unique, one of a kind beauty.

“It’s not a big deal,” Harry assures, waving a hand flippantly. “You’re here now.”

Louis smiles and his entire expression brightens, eyes pressing into squints and crinkling at the corners. “That I am.”

They start right away to make up for lost time and it’s a simple photo shoot. Nothing too complicated or too difficult. They're shooting for charity that Louis is doing out of the kindness of his heart and Harry feels his heart warm at the thought of Louis.

It becomes obvious why Louis is good at his job soon enough; he knows exactly what he needs to do to get the best photograph and he does it all even before Harry instructs him. His eyes burn right into the camera and his body moves like a river, smooth and unrestrained.

He was born to be on billboards and splattered over magazines.

The only injustice is that, from what Harry knows, Louis hasn’t met his soulmate either so no matter which photographer that he shoots with, the pictures always appear as black and white.

Harry wonders what the color of Louis’ eyes look like, what the color of his lips look like, what the color of his hair looks like, what the color of his skin looks like, what the color of the freckles that dot his face look like. It saddens him that he probably won’t know for an indefinite amount of time.

“Did you know you’re beautiful?” slips out of Harry’s mouth at some point while Louis stares broodingly into the camera, eyelashes lowered and lips stained with a color called red.

Louis immediately looks up, eyes bright with fondness. “Why thank you, Harry Styles,” he replies, grinning just slightly. “You’re not too bad yourself.”

Harry flushes and decides not to open his mouth anymore unless he’s giving instructions because he’s only going to embarrass himself further and he doesn’t want that.

They take a small break around noon and Harry runs off to the loo partly because he doesn’t know if can stand to look at Louis a second longer without doing something stupid like kissing him but mostly because he was in such a rush this morning that he’d entirely forgotten to use the bathroom.

It’s only later as he finishes washing his hands and turns to grab a paper towel that he bumps into someone, nearly falling over in attempt to right himself but thankfully the person catches him before he can fall.

His paper towel flutters to the ground anyways and he moves to grab it but then freezes entirely because the paper towel is no longer a dark shade of grey but some other color that Harry has never seen before in his life.

The tiles on the floor that used to be a rough white color area also now something else entirely.

Harry inhales sharply in surprise and looks up to see Louis Tomlinson staring back at him wide eyed, fingers tightening around Harry’s elbows.

“Oops,” Harry mutters weakly and prays he doesn’t pass out or something worse.

“Hi,” Louis replies, sounding out of breath and he still hasn’t let go of Harry. That’s probably a good thing too because it’s the only thing grounding him to earth and keeping him from floating away into space.

Louis’ eyes are blue. They’re blue and Harry knows this because he can see them right now, blue. Not white, not black, not even grey. They’re blue.

“Your eyes are blue,” Harry says because that’s all his brain can currently register.

When Louis laughs delightedly, Harry decides it’s the best sound he’s ever heard in his life. “And your eyes are green,” he murmurs, eyes soft.

Harry remembers a lot of moments with Louis following that point on but none will ever strike him to the core as that moment did and still does.

The moment he realized fate is real and not just something he read about it in books and saw on the telly. It’s a real, tangible thing that exists and ensures that everything works out the way it’s meant to.

And this time it led him to meet Louis, his soulmate, his best friend, his other half, his color in a world that’s black and white.

So there are a lot of things Harry used to wish that he could change, but he thinks that he doesn’t need to anymore because now he has Louis and that’s all he could ever ask for.

In this lifetime and every other one.

**Author's Note:**

> Come [say hi to me on tumblr](http://lourrynavy.tumblr.com) or [say hi to me on twitter](http://twitter.com/deepestIove) and tell me what you thought of this! Comments and kudos are always so very appreciated. Thank you for reading!


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